


give it time and you'll be fine.

by stefonzolesky



Category: Wet Hot American Summer (2001)
Genre: Angst sorry, M/M, but i realized too late so, but there's a sweet ending thanks christopher hastings, i realized mckinley was already in bunk 3 when victor was stuck in the lake, ogn spoilers if you care, whatever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-15
Updated: 2018-11-15
Packaged: 2019-08-23 20:45:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16626137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stefonzolesky/pseuds/stefonzolesky
Summary: McKinley decides to treat himself to the walk along the stream that he promised Ben.





	give it time and you'll be fine.

McKinley had seen fire.

It wasn’t as if he hadn’t seen it coming. At least, he  _ should _ have.

His fingers gripped at the frame of the door as he listened in on Ben and Susie’s conversation -- something about tap dancing and grass.

“I don’t have to take this,” Susie had said, not giving McKinley a second glance as she stormed out the door.

Ben was grumbling to himself as McKinley pulled himself around and pressed himself against the frame of the door.

“Ooh, somebody’s angry,” He said. “Want to blow this place so we can go for a walk by a stream, you can talk it out, I’ll listen, and eventually you’ll be assured it will be okay?”

Of course, that wasn’t what he was going to ask in the first place. He probably would have said something more along the lines of earlier’s, “You taking a break? Five minutes is enough time for me, if you get the angle right.” The circumstances really didn’t call for that, though, so he opted for something that might get him a better response, and maybe keep Ben’s stress levels down.

What it did was the  _ exact fucking opposite. _

Ben had whipped around, steaming, and yelled,  _ “McKinley! When will you figure out that I’m busy! You clingy fuck!” _

McKinley shrunk back.

Clingy.

His mouth snapped shut. Ben shrunk back.

“Wait,” He said. “I didn’t mean… It’s just there’s a lot, and I don’t have time right --”

McKinley, to keep from crying, did the only thing he could think to do: slap his middle finger right against Ben’s nose.

“-- now.”

Thinking back on it, McKinley really hopes Ben watched him go. He thinks it might have been too little of a gesture, not worth enough, had Ben immediately turned his back. He thinks maybe he  _ was _ being clingy. He thinks that what was meant to be a romantic gesture can definitely come off in a lot of ways. He thinks that all these ways exist, even if he isn’t sure what they are.

He thinks a lot.

McKinley decides to treat himself to the walk along the stream that he promised Ben.

The week prior had been incredible. More than incredible. McKinley fell hard and fast for Ben on the first day of camp, and it didn’t seem like either of them were planning on drawing back.

Going into town the night before was when things started to get a little rocky. Not so rocky to the point where either of them were worried, but rocky enough that McKinley dwelled on Ben spending so much time with Susie a little too much. He didn’t let it show -- he never did -- instead going on about fries and onion rings, but still. McKinley finds himself anxious more often than not at this point.

Clingy.

Did Ben really mean that? Does Ben really think he’s clingy?

He tries to shake it off, kicking a rock down the hiking trail by Dead Son’s Path -- recently named Sunshine Path in a lazy attempt to be done with all the revisions to camp in order to spend more time with Ben.

_ Fuck, _ maybe he really  _ was _ a clingy fuck. It would explain the way Ben had been stepping back to focus on producing for Susie -- maybe he wasn’t even gay! Maybe he just felt bad for McKinley, because he could tell that McKinley really liked him. Maybe McKinley should be less clingy and weird. Maybe McKinley should stop flirting with him all the time. Maybe McKinley should stop visiting him in the theater at every given opportunity. Maybe McKinley should --

“Think less!”

“McKinley? Fuck, dude, you gotta help me!”

It’s a wonder that, in all the times McKinley had taken the campers up to Dead Son’s Path, he had never gotten far enough to notice that it led right back around to the lake. The lake that had since been drained save for a few puddles of radioactive goo, one of which Victor Pulak had managed to get himself stuck in.

All McKinley’s paranoia drains itself in that exact moment.

“Fuck!” He yells, watching the sharp-toothed kids crawl their way towards the glob of sludge that Victor had lodged himself in. “I’ll go get help!”

Anxiety and guilt and adrenaline pumping through his veins, McKinley darts towards Bunk 3, where he knows half of the counselors are for some fucking reason.

“...it has earned me the rank of Class ‘B’ dungeon master,” the caped boy McKinley never bothered to learn the name of is telling Katie.

“Who cares, you fucking dorks?!” He shouts. “We have real problems!”

As he’s moving back towards the lake, with Lindsay and JJ (he’s sure of it) close behind, he can hear the dorky kid continuing to ramble.

“I did not agree to be a future bride,” Katie huffs, jogging to keep up with him.

McKinley rolls his eyes. “You’re too nice to the nerds, Katie. It’s cruel to be kind.”

Come the end of the toxic sludge slash demon children fiasco, and McKinley isn’t entirely sure how it happened, Camp Firewood has a new, secret, clean bathroom. After giving Andy’s death ramp a shove into the disgusting,  _ burning _ bathroom, he’s gotten enough energy out to brush off his hands and depart from the group. They can handle a little more chaos on their own, anyway.

McKinley thinks he should be apologizing to Ben. He thinks Ben might still be mad at him. He thinks that he’s probably a bad person for being thankful that Victor got trapped in a pool of toxic waste so that he could use it as a distraction. He thinks that of the two apology cards that Nancy gives them access to, Ben will like the one with the dog on it best. He thinks that maybe he thinks way too much.

He gives a smile when Beth sits down next to him, holding the same card, and he gives another, far more sheepish one when he presents the card to Ben.

McKinley almost thinks twice about it when Ben says, “McKinley, what is this? I don’t have time to be handed things right now,” but he pushes through.

“Just read it,” He says, moving the card closer to Ben. Ben’s eyebrows furrow when he reads, which is fucking adorable, and almost outweighs the nerves coursing through McKinley’s veins.

“Do you mean it?” Ben finally asks.

“Yes,” McKinley promises, a soft ‘oof’ escaping his lips as Ben wraps him into a tight hug. “Just like the card with the sad dog says, ‘I’m sorry, I know I’m ‘im-paws-ible sometimes.’”

Ben laughs, and mumbles against his neck, “Well, I’ve been a little ‘ruff’ myself.”

When Ben whispers in his ear what he thinks they should do next, cheeks hot against McKinley’s face, McKinley couldn’t pull him away any faster.

He knows that he loves Ben. He’s known that the whole time.

**Author's Note:**

> so this is literally just scenes from the ogn + internal monologue but after learning about ben's temper i couldn't not write this. sorry.


End file.
